He kept company with Shaykh Abū ʿĀmir, the tutor who is buried with Shaykh Ruslān beneath the latter’s domed mausoleum outside Bāb Tūmā; a third man lies with them, Abū al-Majd, Ruslān’s attendant. Abū ʿĀmir, for his part, had accompanied Shaykh Yāsīn, the disciple of Shaykh Maslama.

It is further related that Maslama the ascetic had been a companion of Shaykh ʿAqīl (1), who had associated with Shaykh ʿAlī ibn ʿUlaym, the associate of Abū Saʿīd al-Kharrāz.

By trade he was a wood-sawyer. One report says that for years he would take his wages, hand them over to his shaykh Abū ʿĀmir, and the shaykh would feed him in return. Another report states that he used to divide his pay: one third he gave in charity, one third he kept for his own sustenance, and one third he spent on his remaining needs.

He first devoted himself to worship in a mosque inside Bāb Tūmā next to his house; later he moved to the mosque of Darb al-Ḥajar, settling on its eastern side while Shaykh Abū al-Bayān (2) occupied the western side. They worshipped there together for a time, each attracting a company of disciples. Shaykh Ruslān then departed with his followers to the mosque of Khālid ibn al-Walīd, opposite whose tomb he remained, worshipping Allah until he died around 550 AH, or shortly thereafter.

I have already recorded some of his accounts in my Major History.

He was scrupulously pious and constant in devotion, a man of spiritual states and stations. Full information about him has not reached me as it should, but I am aware that he also busied himself with the pursuit of knowledge.

258 – Abū al-Ḥusayn al-Zāhid ibn Abī ʿAbd Allāh ibn Ḥamzah al-Maqdisī *

He is the ascetic, the exemplar, the saint: Abū al-Ḥusayn ibn Abī ʿAbd Allāh ibn Ḥamzah al-Maqdisī.